Anastas Mikoyan: a butcher or a complex historical personage
The Yerevan Municipality’s decision to set up a monument to famous Soviet statesman Anastas Mikoyan has evoked varied responses by Armenian intellectuals.
Some of them consider him a butcher, who was responsible for the death of thousands of Armenians, including intellectuals, while others believe he is a complex historical personality.
Art Director of Yerevan Puppet Theater Ruben Babayan told Tert.am that “Yerevan does not at all need” a monument to such a statesman.
“I believe the period of Stalin’s rule was a criminal period for all the peoples of the Soviet Union, including Armenia’s people. Anastas Mikoyan was one of the most active figures of that criminal regime, who, I think was a butcher. Regrettably, all the decisions made now follow the logic of our country’s development. This is idealizing the Soviet period, presenting it as the best period in Armenia’s history.”
The reason for such a decision is the absence of a comprehensive analysis of the past 100 years, at least of what happened to Armenia, its people and intellectuals, moral and spiritual world.
“When such analyses fail to be made, we can witness such deviations,” Babayan said. He cites the example of Germany, where first graders gain knowledge of Nazism is and how disastrous it proved for the nation.
“And we can hardly imagine a monument of Hitler or Goebbels anywhere. But it is possible in Russia, with its numerous monuments to Lenin and a wish for setting up ones to Stalin or Feliks Dzierżyński. And this tendency is getting stronger in Armenia, and this is [the decision on a monument to Mikoyan] is one of the first steps.”
Literary critic Arkmenik Nikoghosyan told Tert.am that Anastas Mikoyan “played a very bad role in our people’s history in the 1930s, and his monument must not be set up in Yerevan.”
In response to a remark that some people are for such a monument, he said:
“Yes, but what accounts for that? We are a people with hang-ups, and Anastas Mikoyan was among the statesmen ‘at the helm.’ And some people like the fact that we had such a statesman of Armenian descent, and they did not get to the heart of the matter. Anastas Mikoyan is nothing but a statesman ‘at the helm’ for them.”
Asked if he means the Yerevan mayor and the Yerevan City Council members that are supporting the idea, Nikoghosyan said:
“I do not think they are well informed of the materials that relate to Anastas Mikoyan. Mass media share the responsibility for that as well. For the past two or three years they have been putting him in a favorable light.”
Expert in Yeghishe Charents studies David Gasparyan told Tert.am that Anastas Mikoyan’s personality resembles the development of the Soviet Union.
He knows about a monument to Anastas Mikoyan in Armenia’s Yeghegnadzor region.
“It is because that region was once named Mikoyan region. So we already have a monument to Mikoyan in Armenia.”
According to Gasparyan, Anastas Mikoyan was a rather complex historical personality.
“He was one of the heroes both in the 1930s and in the 1950s, when people were rehabilitated. Therefore, you cannot speak of that man without reservations. I cannot say anything of whether they are going to set up a monument or not. I do not think it is serious for me to interfere.”
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